Golf has a squeaky clean reputation but no sport is perfect. Some of golf's all time greats have either had to deny incidents of cheating or move to other locales to get a fresh start after being banned by the particular tour itself. Announcers focus on how much $$ golf contributes to charity and interviews with the players are anything but controversial. The circus that follows the golf tours knows where their bread is buttered. Why upset the staus quo or apple cart? THEY can be easily replaced. I'm surprised the situation still exists in this day and age.
If one reads the golf box scores, there seems to be at least 1 person who has been disqualified. Very little mention of the incidents. I'm sure many of them are not related to cheating but it would be informative to the viewer to find out why a player has been disqualified. But there have been many, albeit toned down incidents, where a played has been caught by the evil eye in the sky for either moving the ball, or not replacing a ball when it has been marked prior to then after a rain delay. In one case the ball was replaced a considerable distance wawy from which it was originally marked. Only the core golf fan or golf insider knows about this.
One common practice (but never talked about on TV) is 'teeing it up on the greens." Occasionally a ball will settle into a small indentation or ball mark. Although the player is allowed to mark the ball and repair the ball mark, he or she does not always replace the ball in the exact same location where it was originally marked. It is very difficult for this action to be detected by the fellow playing partners but I am sure that the cameras have these incidents on tape.
Just last week I was warching a European tour even where a player was accused of cheating, the incident was denied by the player. No penalty was assessed. The next day the player admitted that he "might" have moved the ball and assessed himself a two shot penalty. Yet he was allowed to complete the tournament. You either moved or did not move the ball. If you did not move the ball then why admit to a penalty. If you did then why not a DQ for signing for the wrong score?
Incidents where a player was caught using a club or ball not conforming to the rules are not reported very widely if at all.
I think golf is ripe for a scandal soon and part of the blame should go to the media entourage for not having the balls (oops courage) to go against the flow and report the facts.
So am I in the minority on this? What's y'all's opinion? Who IS the best (and worst) in reporting (or not reporting) the facts?
If one reads the golf box scores, there seems to be at least 1 person who has been disqualified. Very little mention of the incidents. I'm sure many of them are not related to cheating but it would be informative to the viewer to find out why a player has been disqualified. But there have been many, albeit toned down incidents, where a played has been caught by the evil eye in the sky for either moving the ball, or not replacing a ball when it has been marked prior to then after a rain delay. In one case the ball was replaced a considerable distance wawy from which it was originally marked. Only the core golf fan or golf insider knows about this.
One common practice (but never talked about on TV) is 'teeing it up on the greens." Occasionally a ball will settle into a small indentation or ball mark. Although the player is allowed to mark the ball and repair the ball mark, he or she does not always replace the ball in the exact same location where it was originally marked. It is very difficult for this action to be detected by the fellow playing partners but I am sure that the cameras have these incidents on tape.
Just last week I was warching a European tour even where a player was accused of cheating, the incident was denied by the player. No penalty was assessed. The next day the player admitted that he "might" have moved the ball and assessed himself a two shot penalty. Yet he was allowed to complete the tournament. You either moved or did not move the ball. If you did not move the ball then why admit to a penalty. If you did then why not a DQ for signing for the wrong score?
Incidents where a player was caught using a club or ball not conforming to the rules are not reported very widely if at all.
I think golf is ripe for a scandal soon and part of the blame should go to the media entourage for not having the balls (oops courage) to go against the flow and report the facts.
So am I in the minority on this? What's y'all's opinion? Who IS the best (and worst) in reporting (or not reporting) the facts?
